


Waiting for a Spark

by nojoking



Category: Sharing Knife - Lois McMaster Bujold
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-24
Updated: 2016-02-24
Packaged: 2018-05-23 00:07:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 644
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6098407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nojoking/pseuds/nojoking
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dag is doing too much thinking. Tired and bored and waiting for something to happen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Waiting for a Spark

I’m so tired, thought Dag. I just want this all to go away. 

Every time I go on patrol, they expect me to do so much, to be the best at tracking, to be the furthest seeing. To teach all the youngsters, to train them in what they have to learn. 

Thank the Gods, if there are such things still interested in this benighted place, that the patrol leader and the company commander and the camp don’t keep pressing me to do what I will not do any more. I’ll do what they ask – and they often ask more than I can bear – but I won’t volunteer. My days of telling others what to do died at Wolf Ridge. 

I tried there – and those revolting songs lie about what happened. It wasn’t glorious. It wasn’t a success. It wasn’t a victory. Everything I was and everything I was looking forward to died there in the mud and the blood. I could weep but I can’t find the energy. Thinkin’ about it, I’m not sure that I ever did any weeping.   
Lots of sad, lots of big sad, lots of dismal, lots of can't-be-bothered, (I'll forget the times of mad and nearly mad, and the oh-so-angry) – but weep – nope. Not for me. Don’t think there’s enough tears to cope with Wolf Ridge. 

S’pose I’ll just keep going until a malice gets me. Even the songs don’t tell of anyone ever killing more than a dozen or so. But thanks be, somehow my patrol mates seem to skate past thoughts like that. I know they can count – they all know I’ve killed two dozen or more. And I’ve still got Kaunea’s blade ready and willing. I’ll just keep blocking and blanking just the way I do when I get near one of those vile things. Hate them. I hate them for what they do and what they did. I hate them. 

Doesn’t seem much room in between hating them and being tired of this patrolling. Sure as heck, camp is no better – halfway between being bored and hatred, I suppose. 

And, actually, why do we spend so much time protecting farmers who don’t want our protection. When did this all start – and why. I don’t remember ever having that thought before. Not on my own and able to think about it. I’ve joined in the arguments around the camp fire – both on patrol and back at the lake – why do we do what we do?

Couldn’t there be a better way for us to use our skills? Is killing malices the only thing we have to do with our lives? So many of us die – and there doesn’t seem to be a good answer. When did we take on this responsibility? And will it go on forever?

Farmers – ugh. They don’t listen, they don’t seem to care. They just spread and sprawl across the country making more and more places where they lay themselves out as malice-bait. Just like this lot up from Glassforge. Greedy, pushy, selfish – actually what do we as Lakewalkers get out of this arrangement. – yeah, that’s right, nothing except abuse and dislike. What a waste – but I can’t think of anything better to do. Different, yeah, I could go back to camp and enjoy the company of Dar and the rest of them. So much ‘better’ – not. 

Oh well, perhaps the next malice will do me in – then I won’t have to bother about me, my patrol, my *xxx mother and my equally complicated brother, my camp or any stupid, uncaring farmers. Otherwise, I’ll just keep riding along in these tired old clothes, stinking just a little and hoping for a good night’s sleep sometime soon. 

Perhaps I can take a break at this farm. Perhaps something interesting will happen soon. Oh well, it’ll all be the same in a thousand years.


End file.
